Clevercell Very disappointing...

Blucher One of the worst movies I've ever seen

SnoReptilePlenty Memorable, crazy movie

Kien Navarro Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Lee Eisenberg Warner Bros. spent much of the 1930s as the studio that turned out gangster-themed movies (and launched the Looney Tunes later in the decade). It was a surprise to learn that the studio known for Humphrey Bogart and Bugs Bunny also made "Dames", the sort of musical for which MGM was usually known.What I like about this movie is that it shows puritanical people as regressive lunatics (they really are). I just wish that they had done so without all the musical numbers. Seriously, the whole thing is a happy-go-lucky ego trip. If you ask me, the best kind of musicals - aside from the Beatles' movies - are satirical ones: the musical versions of "Reefer Madness" and "The Evil Dead".As for this one, I took the time to look for strings holding up the clothes during the "Girl at the Ironing Board" sequence (and I could make out a few of them).Basically, it's not the sort of movie that I recommend.

Dunham16 His 1933 blockbuster 42ND STREET focuses on serious issues backstage of performers and show creators. The following year he used three members of its principal cast, Guy Kibbee, Dick Powell and Ruby Keeeler as three of his leads in DAMES casting other familiar faces from Hugh Herbert to Joan Blondell to Zasu Pitts. This is a screwball comedy few of the scenes played straight its ending ending having nothing to do with tying up the threads of the plot. The brilliance of this film in my opinion is the way Berkley softens the true presentation of the hard life and desperation of show business people of the era by having a longer production number of the finished show filmed than in most of his films and having his two well known character actors, Hugh and ZaSu filming much of their familiar comic shtick to soften the blow of the reality of the scenes of the hard times of the performers.

atlasmb If you look at the movie poster or watch the trailer for this film, it is clearly--and unabashedly--marketing the fact that it contains hundreds of women, many of whom were used in Busby Berkeley's huge production numbers. "Dames" also contains hints of pre-Code scandal and nudity--just hints.This Depression-era film, with its energetic dancing, upbeat songs, and extravagant displays of youthful enthusiasm and beauty was designed to take viewers away from the realities outside the theater doors. And it does that very well.Dick Powell, Ruby Keeler, Joan Blondell, and a wonderful cast of character actors including Guy Kibbee, Zasu Pitts, and Hugh Herbert thespiate (that must be a word) through a script that holds together but is largely inconsequential, except to provide a contrast between the opprobrium of Hugh Herbert's (Ezra Ounce) character, which is directed at the impropriety of the theater, and the onstage (and on screen) entertainment.The entire film is held together by the glue of two great songs: "I Only Have Eyes For You" and "Dames". Dick Powell is the perfect vocalist (of his day).The other "star" of the film is Mr. Berkeley's imaginative staging and camera work, including zooms, camera movement and special effects that are start-of-the-art in 1934.This is a classic because it provides a view of its era, and stylistically it is a paragon of its genre. After "Dames", there will be better scripts, better dancing, better effects, etc., but it encapsulates the spirit of its time.

funkyfry This film defines "factory film-making" -- total paint by the numbers approach to musical film, with contempt for the intelligence of its audience. Let's wrack up the film's most obvious faults -- only one memorable song ("I Only Have Eyes for You") which unfortunately is played twice for a total of about 15 minutes so that you want to tear your hair out. Only one decent (I mean half-way decent) singer in Dick Powell. A poor script that doesn't allow the funny supporting players like Guy Kibbe to rise to the occasion.Everything about this movie was seemingly pulled together in great haste, so that various elements of the story that might have been fun just feel obligatory. Why does Ruby Keeler get angry at Dick Powell (I won't even bother to use the names of their characters.... Powell is "Jimmy", of course), and then decide to do the show anyway? Don't look to the film for any answers. It just seems to happen because that's what the audience expects to see in these films. I guess the formula was so set by this point that they felt they could use shorthand to express even what are supposedly the primary emotional moments in the story."Eyes for You" shows up so early, and so intimate, that it was easy for me to predict it would be used later for the extravaganza. In fact basically the structure of this movie is the first 2/3rds are a half-baked situational comedy about Guy Kibbe trying to inherit $10 million, and then the last 1/3rd is just a series of increasingly mind numbing musical sequences that have no relationship to the story or characters or to any idea. Geometrical shapes are used in stunning arrangements by Busby Berkeley -- my problem is that there is never any concept behind it. It's kind of neat to look at, but totally pointless. And the "Eyes" sequence with hundreds of images of Ruby Keeler is actually disturbing. I don't know how big of a fan you'd have to be of Ruby Keeler to watch that without feeling an urge to vomit or to run screaming out of the theater. Disembodied Ruby Keeler heads seem to lunge and lurch all about and then form their own geometric shapes, and at the end as it's supposed to be Powell's dream we should worry about his mental state. But of course, as usual there's also no attempt to show anything that could actually happen on a stage, despite the fact that the entire running length of the film prior to these sequences has been about Powell putting on a Broadway show everything we see is camera tricks that could never work on stage.In the film's most embarrassing skit, Powell's character plays some kind of showbiz bigwig who refuses to see George White and George Gershwin but readily allows a group of "dames" to enter his office and practically attack him. "Who knows the names of those composers?" he tells us, "Admit it, you pay to see the dames." This kind of cynical joke reveals everything about the mindset of the producers of this film, and explains why it's such a piece of garbage now compared to the better musicals of the 30s and 40s. First of all, the people behind this film would have been better off to hire somebody like Gershwin who could have provided some memorable music. Instead it's full of pointless sequences with hundreds of plump girls going through boring military routines in geometric shapes. Geez Mr. Powell, I sure do like that better than those lame musicals that actually have, you know, good music and decent stories.Lame, insulting to the intelligence, insulting to the taste, it's no wonder the steam ran out of these types of musical shows long before the big war broke up the party for good.